Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology

Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology SERGIUSZ GRINIEWICZ University of Bialystok KEYWORDS: proto-terms, terminology forming, hyperonymy, semantic fields, synonymy INTRODUCTION In the vocabulary of every language there exists a layer between common words and terms consisting of so-called proto-terms. It is connected with the period of transition from pre-scientific to scientific stages of cognition and early stages of formation of scientific terminologies. Investigating proto-terms reveals main tendencies in emergence of terminologies and evolution of mind. There are two approaches in exploring the formation of terminologies, which in reality is exploring the evolution of culture and human consciousness. The first one presupposes diachronic analysis of the quantitative and qualitative changes of the chosen terminology starting from the earliest lexeme. The second one involves a preliminary examination of the present structure and state of the chosen terminology which makes it possible to fully appreciate changes in its historical development. The first one enables fuller understanding of sometimes quite sudden and hardly comprehensible changes in word meanings that reflect changes in apprehension of notions while the second makes it possible to estimate the evolution of ideas on the basis of knowledge of its results. The present structure of ideas is revealed by establishing hyponymic (hierarchical) relations between their nominations. The choice of legal terminology is caused by its particular status. Law was one of the three specialties taught in the early universities: since for every man three most important aspects were his body, his soul and his property and safety. The importance of clear understanding and evading doubts in taking legal decisions cannot be overestimated. It reflects in the character of legal 6 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology terminology – the tendency towards precision in defining legal concepts, which is usually characteristic for technical terminologies, concomitance with the requirement of clarity and understandability of meaning of legal terms; decisive role of legal terms in normative and governing documents. We may conclude that such documents as administrative or criminal codes in reality are collections of terms and their definitions. 1. COLLECTING WORDS NAMING THE NOTION “WITNESS” To explore formation of legal terminology we may take as an example the notion of witness. Nowadays this notion may be expressed by a number of synonyms that may be found in dictionaries of synonyms. As the initial source of our investigation we have chosen the Chambers SuperMini Thesaurus (CSMT 1998). It has the following merits: – it contains a substantial amount of lexical units (over 155,000 synonyms and antonyms); – this is a well-known publishing-house with a reputation for thoroughness and good quality of dictionaries; – this edition is quite recent and may be considered an authority on English today. As the starting point of our research we take the entry witness. It contains two groups of synonyms: 1. testifier, attestant, deponent (fml); 2. onlooker, eye-witness, looker-on, observer, spectator, viewer, watcher, bystander. The presence of the two groups of synonyms points to the fact that the chosen word “witness” is polysemic. Therefore it seems logical to turn to the definition of this word in the defining dictionaries with the aim of establishing the exact meanings of this term. In the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (OALD 2000) we find four meanings: 1. person who sees sth (also eye-witness) – a person who sees sth happen and is able to describe it to other people; 2. (in court of law) – a person who gives evidence in a court of law: a defence / prosecution witness; 3. (of signature) – a person who is present when an official document is signed and who also signs it to prove that they saw this happen; Terminologija | 2016 | 23 7 4. (of religious beliefs) – evidence of a person’s strong religious beliefs, that they show by what they say and do in public. In the Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture (LDELC 1999) we find three definitions: witness/1/. (also eyewitness) – someone who is present when something happens, especially a crime or an accident; witness/2/. – someone who tells in a court of law what they saw happen, or what they know about a person; witness/3/. – someone who is present at the writing of an official paper and signs it to show that they have seen the writer sign it. The seeming discrepancy comes from the fact that in the second dictionary only a person is considered. In the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary (MWD 2004) we find five meanings: 1. testimony; 2. one that gives evidence; 3. one present at a transaction so as to be able to testify that it has taken place; 4. one who has personal knowledge or experience of something; 5. something serving as evidence of proof. We can view the discrepancy between presenting the same notion, or rather a set of related notions. The OALD defines this word as mainly denoting a person and omitting “testimony”, while the CSMT in the respective entry views it only as a person, though in the same dictionary in the entry “testimony” we find witness as one of the synonyms. The last thing may be viewed as inconsistency, because synonymic relations are reciprocal – if witness is a synonym of testimony, then in the entry “witness” should be presented the third group of synonyms with the meaning “testimony”. Also the order of presentation of synonyms is quite meaningful. According to the authors “the most important and relevant meanings first” (back cover), also “order from the most common to the least frequently used, or specialised” (Introduction) which could be added to the merits of this dictionary. In some dictionaries we have the alphabetic order, which seems to be quite useless because it does not show the difference between the most 8 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology frequently used and most close synonyms and those that are obsolescent, coming out of use, are only partial synonyms or just related lexemes. It is curious that all of the words included in the first group of synonyms are not presented as entry words; they do not have their own entries in the CSMT. That may be seen as a drawback of the dictionary. In the case that these words were not included as entry words because they are seldom used (or are not important) this principle should be mentioned in the introduction, or they should have referring entries. Still we may guess that this dictionary which is rather small includes only common words, while in the first group we have terms. We concentrate, therefore, on the second group of synonyms. It is interesting to notice that almost all of them except the last one are based on the fact of viewing something. This is confirmed by the OALD which defines the first meaning of the word “witness” as “a person who sees sth happen and is able to describe it to other people”. Also indirectly it is confirmed by the absence of the word “ear-witness” which is present in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED 1989) – the largest dictionary of the English language (with the meaning “a person who testifies, or is able to testify, to something on the evidence of his own hearing”) and, therefore, belongs to the English vocabulary. Comparison of presentation of synonyms in the existing English dictionaries of synonyms in the last ten years revealed incompleteness of providing synonyms in their entries. For example, in the same dictionary (CSMT) the entry of the word to look contains 17 synonyms, while the analysis of entries of these synonyms resulted in finding 34 more synonyms of the word “to look” (twice as many) in the same dictionary. This is an extraordinary case, but the experience of investigating synonymy points to the fact that even in the largest dictionaries of synonyms not all synonyms are presented in the entries. To ensure completeness of collecting synonyms we have to analyse entries of the synonyms presented in the initial entry. The first of the synonyms of the word “witness” – onlooker – is, according to its position, the closest synonym of the word witness and has in its own entry the following synonyms: bystander, observer, spectator, looker-on, eye-witness, witness, watcher, viewer. The first thing that may be noticed here is the fact that all of the synonyms of the word onlooker are also included in the entry of “witness”. Terminologija | 2016 | 23 9 That points to the fact that those two entry words may have exactly the same meaning (which may be proved or disproved by comparing respective definitions in defining dictionaries). It is worth noting, in our opinion, that the word “looker-on”, which has, according to the OED, exactly the same meaning as the word onlooker, being a variant of the latter, does not begin the list of synonyms, but has fourth place. Should it be considered as breaking the rules established by the authors themselves? Perhaps it means that the word looker-on is seldom used which may be reflected in the fact that it is not present both in the MWD and in the OALD. The second of the synonyms – eye-witness – has in its entry in the dictionary the following synonyms: witness, observer, spectator, looker-on, onlooker, bystander, viewer, passer-by (it is convenient to underline new lexemes which are possible additional synonyms). As we have pointed out above, in the CSMT eye-witness is regarded not as a species of the notion witness, but rather as a variant (absolute synonym), and so the entries of the words witness and eye-witness should be exactly the same, with exception perhaps of the last word of the initial entry – bystander, which does not point explicitly to the faculty of viewing being used. However, according to the OALD, it has the meaning “a person who sees sth that is happening but is not involved”, so, in fact, it also is the synonym to the word eye-witness, and is quite justly presented in its entry. Nevertheless there is a difference (apart from the different order of presentation – which may prove to be quite important, showing the difference in usage and closeness of meaning) in an additional word passer-by which is missing in the initial entry and the absence of the word watcher. It should be mentioned, that apart from the rest of synonyms that presuppose viewing, witnessing something, bystander and passer-by do not necessarily mean witnessing, but rather involve the possibility of viewing something. Nevertheless they may be included into the analysed semantic field. The entry observer contains the following words: watcher, spectator, viewer, witness, looker-on, onlooker, eyewitness (a different form of the already presented synonym!), commentator, bystander, beholder. There are three new words here. Besides eyewitness which is a different form of the already presented synonym we have some completely new 10 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology words. Beholder according to its meaning should have been placed in the initial entry, while commentator is quite different. There are no common synonyms in its entry with the initial entry “witness” and even the word observer is not presented there (?), so it is clearly quite outside of the semantic field “witness”. In many entries of synonyms we can find, apart from the same synonyms as in the first entry, two groups of words: – those that in our opinion should be included in the field and the first entry – sometimes their number being quite substantial as in the case of to look (CSMT) with additional synonyms supplied in the entries of its synonyms; – those that are quite different in meaning from the initial word. In the entries of the words spectator, viewer, watcher and bystander we did not find any new synonyms. In Roget’s Thesaurus of English Words & Phrases (RTEW 2002) witness does not have a separate entry, but is presented as a synonym in the entries evidence and record – which means that it is regarded rather as a material object, in the fourth meaning of OALD and the first and fifth meanings of the MWD. In the Oxford Paperback Thesaurus (OPT 2001) the entry witness contains the following synonyms: 1. observer, onlooker, eyewitness, spectator, viewer, watcher; bystander, passer-by; 2. evidence, indication, proof, testimony. It is quite clear that the word witness has two quite different meanings; the first group contains the already known words, but we may find some new words in their entries. Also it is interesting that although this dictionary is larger there are no new synonyms in the entry of the word witness. In the entry observer we find additional words fly-on-the-wall, rubberneck, beholder (which do not have their entries in the same dictionary); sightseer (which does not qualify as a synonym of witness); in the entry spectator – commentator, reporter, monitor (all of them not qualifying); in the entry watcher – a new word spy (not qualifying); in the entry bystander – a new word non-participant (not qualifying) and gawper /informal/ which may be added to the list of synonyms. Terminologija | 2016 | 23 11 The resulting list of synonyms of the word witness in the meaning of a person looks in the following way (in alphabetic order): attestant, beholder, bystander, deponent (fml); ear-witness, eyewitness, eye-witness, fly-on-the-wall, gawper, looker-on, observer, onlooker, passer-by, rubberneck, spectator, testifier, viewer, watcher – 18 lexemes. Further analysis of internet sources, such as the www.TheFreeDictionary.com and www.thesaurus.com and especially www.powerthesaurus.org reveal the existence of further synonyms of the chosen word, namely – attestator, attester, attestor, corroborator, gawker, gazer, ogler, passerby, peeper, perceiver, rubbernecker, seer, signatory, signer, voyeur, witnesser – 16 additional lexemes. Checking their synonyms gives additional five words – earwitness, gaper, goggler, starer, voyeur. So as the final result we have 40 words that may be used to denote the notion witness (a person) and together constitute the respective semantic field. The majority of them are naming various types of witnesses. Some of these lexical forms are used as proto-terms but also in everyday speech while some of them (such as attestant, deponent, testifier, signatory) are already terms. 2. ESTABLISHING HIERARCHICAL RELATIONS IN THE SEMANTIC FIELD “WITNESS” To establish the structure of the formed semantic field we classify the collected synonyms on the genus–species principle starting with those with the broadest meaning, dividing them into groups and subgroups down to the names of narrowest notions that form the lowest level of classification. To create such classification we start with collecting descriptions of the meanings of the chosen words, presented in defining dictionaries, such as LDELC, MWD, OED, www.TheFreeDictionary.com and www.powerthesaurus.org. While classifying notions we find that some notions have several names – in this way we reveal absolute (full) synonyms. At the same time some names have more than one meaning and are used to denote several notions. For example, the initial word witness has three meanings. Such cases in terminology we traditionally view as homonymy. We may also come across the hidden polysemy/homonymy often marked by using the conjunction or in the definition, i.e. starer – a person who looks steadily for a long time esp. in great surprise or shock; gaper – a person looking hard in 12 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology surprise or wonder, especially with a mouth open or witness/2/ (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they saw happen, or what they know about a person – where definition in reality points to two different notions. In this case we are substituting such word by two words: starer/1/ – a person looking steadily in great surprise and starer/2/ – a person looking steadily in shock; gaper/1/ – a person looking hard in surprise, especially with a mouth open and gaper/2/ – a person looking hard in wonder, especially with a mouth open; witness/2/ (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they saw happen and witness/4/ (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they know about a person. We also find in the dictionaries information provided about variants of some words; such variation together with homonymy results in increasing the number of lexemes under investigation to 55. The preferable names for notions are marked by the bold type. Attestant/1/ – (law) a person who attests to the genuineness of a document or signature by adding their own signature, also = attestator = attest or attestant/2/ – someone who affirms or vouches for the correctness or truth or genuineness of something, also = attester Attestator > attestant/1/, attester = attestant/2/, attestor > attestant/1 beholder – a person who has seen an event happen, and so is able to describe it by-passer > passerby by-stander > bystander bystander – a nonparticipant spectator corroborator – someone who gives supporting evidence deponent – Law. one who testifies, especially in court: earwitness > ear-witness/1/ ear-witness/1/ – (legal) one who attests to things he has heard himself ear-witness/2/ – a person who has heard an event happen, and so is able to describe it eyewitness/1/ – (legal) one who saw the act or fact to which he testifies eyewitness/2/ – a person who has seen an event happen, and so is able to describe it eye-witness/1/ > eyewitness/1/ eye-witness/2/ > eyewitness/2/ fly on the wall > fly-on-the-wallfly-on-the-wall – a possible unnoticed witness gaper/1/ – a person looking hard in surprise, especially with a mouth open* gaper/2/ – a person looking hard in wonder, especially with a mouth open* gawker – a person looking at something in a foolish way Terminologija | 2016 | 23 13 gawkier > gawker gawper – a person looking at something in a foolish way, especially with a mouth open gazer – a person looking steadily, especially for a long time and often with admiration or pleasure and without being conscious of what he/she is doing goggler – a person looking hard with the eyes wide open, or moving around, usually in great surprise looker-on > an onlooker non-participant – f person who does not take part in something observer – someone who observes ogler – a person looking (at) with great interest, especially sexual onlooker – a person who watches something happening without taking part in it passer-by > passerby passerby (passer-by) – a person who (by chance) is walking, driving etc. past a place perceiver – a person, coming to knowledge of something through the senses rubberneck > rubbernecker rubbernecker – (informal, USA) someone who looks with great interest at something that has happened, especially someone who drives very slowly in order to look at an accident on a road signatory – any of the signers of an agreement, esp. among nations signer – someone who signs and is bound by a document spectator – a person who watches especially an event or sport without taking part starer/1/ – a person who looks steadily for a long time esp. in great surprise starer/2/ – a person who looks steadily for a long time esp. in shock starer/3/ – a viewer who gazes fixedly (often with hostility) swearer – someone who takes a solemn oath testifier – one who testifies, especially in court; viewer – a person who watches or is watching attentively, a close observer voyer > voyeur voyeur – a person who enjoys watching the private and especially unpleasant activities of others watcher – a person looking attentively* witness/1/ (potential) = someone who is present when something happens, especially a crime or an accident; witness/2/ – (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they saw happen; witness/3/ – (signing a document) someone who is present at the writing of an official paper and sings it to show that they have seen the writer sign it witness/4/ – (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they know about a person witnesser – who sees an event and reports what happened 14 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology Then we are grouping variants, since they have exactly the same meaning and name the same notions, i.e. attestant/1/ = attestator = attestor, voyeur = voyer. In some cases variants may be used to eliminate polysemy/homonymy; thus the attestant/2/ (someone who affirms or vouches for the correctness or truth or genuineness of something) we may substitute by its variant attester. As the result of such grouping we are establishing the number of notions which is already smaller – 40 notions denoted by 55 lexemes. At the same time we are shortening descriptions, making it more convenient for the subsequent analysis, leaving only short notes, indicating the most important components of meanings. Attestant/1/ – (law) attests to the genuineness by adding his own signature = attestor = attestor attester – vouches for the truth of something = attestant/2/ beholder (spectator) – has seen an event happen, and is able to describe it bystander = by-stander – a nonparticipant spectator corroborator – gives supporting evidence deponent Law. testifies, especially in court: ear-witness/1/ – (legal) attests to things he has heard himself = earwitness ear-witness/2/ – has heard an event happen, and so is able to describe it eyewitness/1/ = eye-witness/1/ – (legal) saw the act or fact to which he testifies eyewitness/2/ = eye-witness/2/ – has seen an event happen, and is able to describe it fly-on-the-wall – a possible unnoticed witness = fly on the wall gaper/1/ – looking hard in surprise, especially with a mouth open gaper/2/ – looking hard in wonder, especially with a mouth open gawker = gawkier – looking at something in a foolish way gawper – looking at something in a foolish way, especially with a mouth open gazer – looking steadily, for a long time and often with admiration or pleasure and without being conscious of what he/she is doing goggler – looking hard with the eyes wide open, or moving around, usually in great surprise non-participant – does not take part in something observer – someone who observes ogler – looking (at) with great interest, especially sexual onlooker = looker-on –watches something happening without taking part in it passerby = by-passer = passer-by – who (by chance) is walking, driving etc. past a place perceiver – becomes aware (of things or events) through the senses Terminologija | 2016 | 23 15 rubbernecker = rubberneck – (informal, USA) looks with great interest at something that has happened, esp. someone who drives very slowly in order to look at an accident on a road signatory – any of the signers of an agreement signer – someone who signs and is bound by a document spectator – watches especially an event or sport without taking part starer/1/ – looks steadily for a long time esp. in great surprise starer/2/ – who looks steadily for a long time esp. in shock starer/3/ gazes fixedly (often with hostility) swearer – someone who takes a solemn oath testifier – testifies, especially in court: viewer – a person who watches or is watching attentively, a close observer voyeur = voyeur – enjoys watching the private and especially unpleasant activities of others watcher – a person looking attentively witness/1/ (potential) – present when something happens, especially a crime or an accident; witness/2/ – (in a court) someone who tells in a court of law what they saw happen, witness/4/ – (in a court) someone who tells what they know about a person witness/3/ – (signing a document) is present at the writing of an official paper and sings it to show that they have seen the writer sign it witnesser – sees an event and reports what happened Then we are dividing witnesses into groups and subgroups. The first division may be based on the difference between the first meaning of the word witness – “someone who was present at the event and may describe it”, which is a possibility and the other three meanings – the second one – “giving evidence in a court about an event”, the fourth one – “giving evidence in a court about a person” and the third one – “signing a document”, both meaning a real witness, an attester. The first large group of words (35 words, 19 notions) names persons present at the event who are possible witnesses. In this group we find two types of notions – in the first subgroup (1.1.) the stress is on perceiving an event, in the second (1.2.) – on abstaining from participation in it. Since they perceive the event, the persons in the first subgroup may be called perceivers. They may be subdivided into ear-witness (1.1.1.) and eye-witnesses (1.1.2.). The majority of such persons view the event and this group may be subdivided according to the way they view it. The general idea of a person simply viewing something is expressed by the 16 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology word beholder, so though it is coming out of usage, nevertheless it might be made the name of this subgroup or perhaps observer would be more appropriate. However since we view it from the point of view of the possibility of being a witness, the best would be eyewitness, with both beholder and observer having the same meaning and being absolute synonyms. In this subgroup (1.1.2.) belong notions of observers, differentiated by the accompanying emotions or manner. The specific features of meaning determining the position of a word in classification are highlighted by underlining corresponding parts of definitions. Witness/1/ – was (is) present at the event and may describe it - perceiver – perceives / perceived the event - - eyewitness/2/ (eye-witness/2/, observer, beholder) – has seen an event happen, and may describe it - - - gaper/1/ – looks in surprise, with mouth open - - - - starer/1/ (goggler) – looks in great surprise with the eyes wide open - - - gaper/2/ – looks in wonder, with mouth open) - - - gazer – looks with admiration or pleasure, unconscious of what he is doing - - - starer/2/ – looks in shock - - - ogler – looks with great interest, esp. sexual - - - starer/3/ – looks fixedly with hostility - - - voyeur (voyer) – secretly watching the private activities of others - - - gawker (gawki(er, gawper) – looking in a foolish way, with mouth open - - - watcher (viewer) – looking attentively - - ear-witness/2/ – has heard an event happen, and so is able to describe it To the subgroup 1.2 belong notions showing the looker-on position: non-participant (onlooker, looker-on, spectator) – present, but not taking part - passerby (by-passer, passer-by) – witnessing the event in passing - - rubbernecker (rubberneck) – in passing looks with great interest at something that has happened - bystander (by-stander) – present at the event standing near by - fly-on-the-wall (fly on the wall) – present at the event but unnoticed, esp. hiding. The second group (20 words, 12 notions) is concerned with the real witnesses. In this group witness in the second and the fourth meanings does not presuppose signing a written document, while for witness in the Terminologija | 2016 | 23 17 third meaning signing is not usually done in a court, so they are on the same level and may be viewed as hyponyms of the word attester (which has only one meaning). What other semantic components do we have here? In the first subgroup we have words with additional information on the way the witnesses received information (ear-witness, eye-witness); looking for definition of deponent we find another term – affiant. attester (attestant/2/) – one who vouches for the truth of something (a real witness) – testifier – one who testifies, esp. in a court – -> witness/2/ in a court – one who testifies about an event – – -> ear-witness/1/ (earwitness) – one who attests to things he has heard himself – – -> eyewitness/1/ (eye-witness/1/, witnesser) – one who saw the act or fact to which he testifies – -> swearer – one who takes a solemn oath – -> witness/4/ – one who tells in a court what they know about a person – -> corroborator – gives additional, supporting evidence – witness/3/ (signing a document) =?signer (signs and is bound by a document) – -> signatory – one signing an agreement – -> deponent (testifying by written affidavit witnessed by notary, UK) = affiant (gives evidence by way of an affidavit, USA). – -> attestant/1/ (attestator, attestor) – one who attests to the genuineness by adding their own signature Hyponymy is connected with the componential analysis, since differential features which are components of the chosen words’ meanings are most easily singled out in consistent subdivision of synonyms into groups, then subgroups, etc., up to the individual notions, because the differential features serve as bases of division. The structure of the meanings in the chosen group would take the following form: attester – real witness testifier – real witness + in a court witness/2/ – real witness + in a court + testifies about an event ear-witness/1/ – real witness + in a court + attests to things he has heard eyewitness/1/ – real witness + in a court + who saw the fact to which he testifies swearer – real witness + in a court + takes a solemn oath witness/4/ – real witness + in a court + what they know about a person corroborator – real witness + in a court + adds supporting evidence* 18 Sergiusz Griniwicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology witness/3/ – real witness + signing a document signatory – real witness + signing a document + an agreement deponent (affiant) – real witness + signing a document + an affidavit attestant (attestator, attestor) – real witness + signing a document + attesting genuineness We may notice that hyponymic relations are quite useful in establishing not only the present structure of the semantic field and hierarchical relations between the notions, but also pointing to the absolute synonymy (words in brackets are absolute synonyms of the main words) and also homonymy (different meanings, both explicit and marked by numbers in a source dictionaries, and hidden – when there is one definition encompassing two different meanings united by the conjunction or) – homonyms are placed in different places in the hierarchical scheme). C O N C L U S I O N Exploring proto-terms gives an insight into the period of transfer from common words denoting notions to terms denoting concepts. This type of exploring ways of forming of special languages may be used in terminological education. For such studies the students do not need to have special knowledge while in the process of carrying out this type of terminological research they gain a lot of interesting knowledge on many everyday ideas and the way they developed into special knowledge. In the last ten years this approach was used in a number of BA and MA dissertations concerned with forming of various terminologies from common notions. Experience gained in exploring various special notions resulted in elaborating and perfecting methods of such investigation. This type of research based on standard methods may be recommended for widespread use in teaching students terminology science and practice. BIBLIOGRAPHY CSMT 1998: Chambers Super-Mini Thesaurus, Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd. LDELC 1999: Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture, Harlow: Longman. MWD 2004: Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary. 11th Edition, Merriam-Webster Incorporated. OALD 2000: Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary. 8th Edition, Oxford University Press. OED 1989: Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press. OPT 2001: Oxford Paperback Thesaurus, Oxford University Press. RTEW 2002: Roget’s Thesaurus of English Words & Phrases, Penguin. http://www.thefreedictionary.com. https://www.powerthesaurus.org. http://www.thesaurus.com. Terminologija | 2016 | 23 19 APIE TEISĖS TERMINIJOS FORMAVIMĄSI Seniau susiformavusių terminijos sričių istorijoje vienas iš įdomiausių yra etapas, kai pereinama nuo kasdienės leksikos prie mokslinės terminijos. Šiam etapui būdingas prototerminų vyravimas. Prototerminų tyrimas suteikia galimybę ne tik nustatyti pagrindines terminijos formavimosi tendencijas, bet ir už šio proceso slypinčią mąstysenos raidą. Pastarųjų dešimties metų tokio pobūdžio tyrinėjimai leido ištobulinti standartinius analizės metodus, kurie gali būti panaudoti studentų baigiamuosiuose darbuose. К ВОПРОСУ О ФОРМИРОВАНИИ ЮРИДИЧЕСКОЙ ТЕРМИНОЛОГИИ В истории формирования терминологий одним из наиболее интересных этапов является стадия перехода от обычной лексики к научным терминам, которой соответствует преобладание прото-терминов. Исследование лексики этого периода дает возможность не только установить основные тенденции формирования терминологий, но и стоящие за этим процессы развития мышления. Опыт таких исследований за последние десять лет дал возможность разработать стандартные методы анализа, которые могут быть использованы в студенческих дипломных исследованиях. Gauta 2016-09-05 Sergiusz Griniewicz University of Bialystok Waska 4, m. 20, Bialystok, 15–481, Poland E-mail [email protected] 20 Sergiusz Griniewicz | Concerning the Formation of Legal Terminology